


We're Invisible in a Violet Sea

by SilverMirror12



Category: Shadowhunters (TV)
Genre: Body Paint, Catharsis, Fluffy Ending, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Implied/Referenced Suicide, M/M, Nostalgic Magnus, POV Magnus Bane, Painting, Supportive Alec
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-28
Updated: 2016-05-28
Packaged: 2018-07-10 19:27:16
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 931
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7002313
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SilverMirror12/pseuds/SilverMirror12
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Humming, Magnus dipped his brush into the cup beside him. Bright blue stained the water like ink as he stirred. “Boredom began gnawing at me when I was in my hundred-and-fifties. It was the middle of the Renaissance, anyway, and I wanted to impress Michelangelo.”</p><p> </p><p>  <em>(Magnus wants to paint Alec.)</em></p>
            </blockquote>





	We're Invisible in a Violet Sea

**Author's Note:**

  * Translation into Русский available: [We're Invisible in a Violet Sea](https://archiveofourown.org/works/8150129) by [Batty_Blue](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Batty_Blue/pseuds/Batty_Blue)



“I didn’t know you painted.”

Humming, Magnus dipped his brush into the cup beside him. Bright blue stained the water like ink as he stirred. “Boredom began gnawing at me when I was in my hundred-and-fifties. It was the middle of the Renaissance, anyway, and I wanted to impress Michelangelo.”

Alec snorted. Magnus looked up from his painting, and grinned wolfishly when he saw that Alec had opted to go shirtless in the June heat. Bless the Angel.

“You know, you’d make an _exquisite_ model, darling.” Magnus’s heart swelled with affection when Alec blushed at his sultry words. Five months of dating and Magnus could _still_ affect his boyfriend so easily. He’d never grow tired of it.

“I don’t think I could sit still that long,” said Alec. He leaned over Magnus’s shoulder to inspect the painting. (And oooh, Alexander might blush, but he was _far_ from innocent, Magnus thought when Alec’s breath warmed the shell of his ear.) “What is that?”

“Ah.” Magnus smiled at the painting. It depicted a modest stone gate that abruptly split in the middle. It continued upward in two massive walls, like someone had looked at the laws of gravity and laughed in its face. White clouds swirled around the gate with tantalizing strips of blue peeking out. It looked like a doorway into the sky itself.

“Pura Lempuyang Luhur,” Magnus murmured. He coated his brush in dark gray paint, and began adding swirling pieces of architecture on the left side of the door. “It’s one of the oldest temples in Bali. This door is the clearest image in my memory.”

Alec pulled up a chair and sat beside Magnus. After scooching until their knees brushed together, he asked, “When was the last time you were there?”

“Over eighty years ago. It was the last time I was in the country, too.” Magnus began to shrug, but caught himself before he made a mistake. “I guess you could say I was feeling a little homesick.”

“I didn’t know you were from Indonesia.”

Magnus laughed. “There’s a lot of things you don’t know about me, darling.” When Alec didn’t answer, Magnus winced when he realized what he said. “Alec, it’s not that I don’t trust you—”

“I know.” Alec kept his eyes on the half-finished painting. “You’ve lived a long life. I doubt it was all sunshine and roses.”

“You could say that.” Magnus mindlessly repainted a brick on the lower fence until it was significantly darker than its fellows. It was such a cruel irony. He could barely recall lsuch a beautiful place after less than a century. Yet the memory of water burning his lungs, and a large hand fisted in his hair…yes, _that_ Magnus remembered clear as day. Even another four-hundred years wouldn’t soften the edges of that memory.

Another hand on him now, this time his lover’s. Magnus smiled at Alec’s worried expression, and squeezed the hand on his shoulder. “I’d like to try something, Alexander. If you’d allow it.”

“Sure,” said Alec, sounding anything but. “What is it?”

“I want to paint you.”

“Magnus, I told you—”

“No, no, you misunderstand me.” Magnus picked up a smaller brush, one free of paint, and tapped the bristles against Alec’s forearm. “I want to _paint you_.”

Alec’s eyebrows raised. For a moment, Magnus was certain he’d say no. Then, “Shouldn’t I lie down for that?”

Magnus kissed him, trying to convey through his lips how grateful he was that Alec would let him do this without even asking why. He loved this boy, he truly did.

They set up on the couch, Alec lying flat on his stomach and Magnus sitting beside him on a stool. Selecting a cool green shade, Magnus took a breath. Even this little thing made his heart thump in his ears. Then Alec turned his head and smiled, and Magnus found that he could breathe again.

Through brush strokes, Magnus wrote about growing up in Batavia, and how it would always _be_ Batavia to him, no matter what the name on the map was today. He wrote about riding in a harness on his father’s back when he tended the fields, and about the songs his mother would sing to him, the ones Magnus forgot the words of but could still hum the melody. He wrote about his mother’s beauty, and her bloating face when he found her swinging from a rope. He wrote about his father’s strength, and how that strength felt as it held him down into the water, like his father was trying to physically push Magnus back to Hell.

Magnus painted his life story on Alec’s back. When he ran out of space, Alec wordlessly offered Magnus his arm.

“I know this is cheating,” Magnus murmured. He’d paused in the telling, and was now painting a heart on Alec’s palm.

“No, it’s—it’s good,” Alec assured him. “It feels…more intimate this way, you know? Cathartic.” Alec glanced at Magnus, obviously worried that he’d used the wrong word. Magnus kissed the frown away.

“One day you’ll hear it all,” Magnus promised him. “If you don’t mind waiting.”

Alec turned his torso and placed his painted hand on Magnus’s cheek. If Magnus closed his eyes, he could imagine the green heart seeping into his skin, and with it, all of Alec’s sincerity and promise. He held Alec’s hand there until the paint warmed between them.

“Hey. Don’t worry.” Alec smiled, pressing his hand closer. “I’m not going anywhere.”

Magnus winked. “Good, because I still plan on getting you to model nude for me someday.”

**Author's Note:**

> Title from _Where Do We Go From Here_ by the patron musician of Malec, Ruelle.
> 
> [This](https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/564x/b0/86/65/b086655283082fa9dc7ef927cac96ef9.jpg) is what Magnus was painting.


End file.
